


Busywork

by youcouldmakealife



Series: Impaired Judgment (and other excuses) [56]
Category: Original Work
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-17
Updated: 2018-10-17
Packaged: 2019-08-03 07:14:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,052
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16321586
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/youcouldmakealife/pseuds/youcouldmakealife
Summary: The Hitmen head back on the road, and Jared hangs out with Hansen a couple times — they’re just playing video games, but it feels different than when he’s doing it alone, less guilt-inducing. He grabs lunch with Gregory, since they’re lineys now, and just because the chemistry came fast doesn’t mean Jared shouldn’t continue to work on it. Texts Bryce about a hundred times. Does approximately seventeen more stupid Buzzfeed quizzes. Scores in OT and they celly so hard he’s got a bruise from it in the morning. Keeping busy.





	Busywork

Jared gets all of a day to indulge in a bit of a sulk before he has to buck up and head to the Saddledome. It’s kind of weird walking into the Hitmen dressing room when they’re already games into the season, to be this sudden roster interloper, but it helps that he knows most of the guys, and the newbies look at him like he’s some legend just for playing in the preseason. He gets a lot of questions about it, and they’d sting more if the guys weren’t clearly fascinated, envious. A few of the other Hitmen who’d been drafted had made it to training camp, but Jared’s the only one who made it past the training camp cut. 

They put Jared on the first line with Hansen again, have moved Gregory up from the second line. Gregory isn’t Chaz, but Jared’s played with him before, and the line clicks well from the get-go. In Jared’s first game back he tallies more points than he had in the entire Oilers preseason, which just kind of stresses that this is maybe the place he needs to be right now.

His dad doesn’t need to drive him home anymore, but he comes to the game as usual, gives Jared a ride to Bryce’s even though Jared could walk it if he wanted to, it’s so close. They do their usual post-mortem, and it feels good. Won’t feel good on a bad night, he’s sure, but a three point night, a win? It feels good.

Bryce is lying on the couch in front of the TV when Jared gets in, laughs as Jared ditches his stuff and goes to lie on top of him.

“You rocked,” he says, and Jared grins into his throat before getting off him and going to make himself a post-game smoothie, Bryce copping a grab of his ass on his way up.

The Flames start their own season on the road, which sucks. Jared doesn’t feel quite at home at Bryce’s when Bryce isn’t there, and he hopes that’s something that’ll change when he gets used to it, that it’ll eventually feel like his place too. In the meantime he goes home and sleeps at his parents’ for the last two nights Bryce is gone, because there’s something depressing about sleeping in Bryce’s — their? — bed without Bryce, and his room at his parents’ doesn’t have the same baggage. Plus they feed him, even though they totally bitch about how he doesn’t even _live_ with them anymore, and yet here he is, eating all their food.

When Bryce gets home they have all of a day of overlapping schedules before Jared heads out of town — and of course, of _course_ , the day before Jared gets back, Bryce is leaving town again — so they make the most of it, and by the most of it Jared means if they’re not sleeping or eating they are almost certainly feeling each other up. Jared keeps hearing about this whole ‘thrill is gone’ thing that’s supposed to happen when you’re in a long-term relationship, but he is still so, so into Bryce’s everything. Though to be fair, most people don’t end up in long-term relationships with guys with an ass like that.

Roadies aren’t that different than they used to be, other than the fact Jared doesn’t have to cram in homework on the bus, can actually do shit he wants to, though that gets stale kind of quick. Like, would he prefer to read Player’s Tribune articles or fiddle around on his Nintendo 3DS than do homework? For sure, but unlike during high school, it doesn’t feel like a break from anything, just feels like he’s blowing through time. Jared is probably going to have to figure out what to do with his days sooner rather than later, because he’s been multitasking school and hockey for so long he suspects he’s going to get bored of his abundant free time really, really soon.

“Maybe you should pick up a hobby,” his mom says when he complains over the phone.

“Mom,” Jared says. “Hockey was a hobby once upon a time and look how that turned out.”

“With you being one of the best in the world?” his mom says. 

Jared snorts.

“Don’t snort, you got drafted,” she says. “You’re one of the best in the world.”

“I meant more that hockey didn’t exactly stay a hobby,” Jared says, rather than try to argue her point, because he knows he’ll lose. She’s right, he’s in the 99.99th percentile or whatever, the issue is that everyone he’s competing with for a spot is too.

“Ah,” his mom says. “That is true. You might become the most terrifying scrapbooker alive.”

“Would you do that to the world, mom?” Jared says. “Would you?”

“No hobbies, then,” she says. “Why don’t you pick up some distance classes?”

“I _just_ finished school,” Jared says.

“And you miss it already,” she says.

Jared glowers, mostly because she’s kind of right. It’s unfortunately not very effective when she can’t even see him.

“I’ll figure something out,” Jared says. “Something that doesn’t involve me taking over the world with a scrapbook or going back to school.”

“Good luck,” his mom says, and Jared pretends not to hear the sarcasm.

“What do you do when you’re not playing?” Jared asks Bryce when he’s back in town. He’s read every single article that interests him. He’s done basically every single buzzfeed quiz, even though they’re stupid. He’s officially sick of video games for the foreseeable future. He’s _bored_.

Bryce gives him a weird look, and Jared realises that probably does sound weird for a couple reasons. One, they’ve been together for, oh, over a fucking _year_ and that he’s just asking now, and also like, it may have sounded accusatory to Bryce. Like, Jared hopes not, but it might have. Sometimes Jared’s innocent questions get the wrong response. Erin says it’s because he has a resting bitch face, like she can talk.

“I’m trying to adjust to all my newfound free time,” Jared says. 

“I dunno,” Bryce says. “I just chill.”

“Chilling is boring,” Jared complains. “I’m sick of chilling.”

“Work out?” Bryce says.

“There’s only so much I can work out before my legs fall off,” Jared says.

“You can work out more though,” Bryce says, and Jared tries to decide if that’s a dig. Probably not? Bryce doesn’t do the whole passive-aggressive thing. Well, at least not with him — the media would probably say otherwise.

Bryce drags Jared to work out with him in the building’s gym the next morning, like, bright and early — way too bright and early — and he can go so much harder than Jared it’s actively embarrassing. Like, Jared knew Bryce was in shape — he has enjoyed the results, uh, a lot, both as a Flames fan and his boyfriend, but apparently he works _really fucking hard_ for that bod. They’ve done on ice stuff together, and Bryce helped him get ready before the combine, but actually working out side by side is mortifying. Jared has a stitch in his side. Jared has a stitch in his side he’s too embarrassed to acknowledge because Bryce has barely broken a sweat. Like, he’s glowing. Sweat isn’t supposed to be sexy, but here Bryce is, fucking glowing.

Once Jared gets over his embarrassment and showers off his own gross and not glowing at all sweat back at their place, he climbs that like a motherfucking tree. 

So that’s one great thing to do with his free time. The sex, he means. Probably the working out is also a good idea if he plans on hitting NHL weight anytime soon. Not that he doesn’t work out, he absolutely does, but — maybe he should be fitting in some extra sessions, especially if they end like this one just did.

The Hitmen head back on the road, and Jared hangs out with Hansen a couple times — they’re just playing video games, but it feels different than when he’s doing it alone, less guilt-inducing. He grabs lunch with Gregory, since they’re lineys now, and just because the chemistry came fast doesn’t mean Jared shouldn’t continue to work on it. Texts Bryce about a hundred times. Does approximately seventeen more stupid Buzzfeed quizzes. Scores in OT and they celly so hard he’s got a bruise from it in the morning. Keeping busy.

Jared’s on his way back home, thankfully for a homestand that actually overlaps with the Flames, when Chaz texts him with, _wanna grab a coffee and tell me about the newbies?_

Jared hesitates, and isn’t sure why, has to take a moment to evaluate the feeling. So, it kind of turns out it sucks when basically everyone you consider a friend is playing in the NHL when you aren’t? And yeah, Chaz is two years older than Jared, and Jared will hopefully be playing in the league by twenty, and Bryce is four years older and, you know, fucking gifted, but still.

It’s just — Chaz is a fucking _Flame_. He’s making almost a million dollars a year, rubbing elbows with the elite. Never mind that Jared is technically rubbing _dicks_ with one of those elite. He still feels like a petty motherfucker about it.

He pushes past it, sends a reply, makes a time.

It’s kind of hard to sit across from Chaz, knowing Chaz is basically living Jared’s dream, but then — Bryce is too, even moreso. There isn’t the same resentment there, though. Maybe because Bryce was already living it when Jared met him, and Chaz slotted into it when Jared had known him for years, been friends with him for a year of that. Maybe because Bryce is so out of Jared’s league on the ice, and Chaz was on Jared’s frigging _line_. 

But Chaz _is_ his friend, and Jared tries to swallow the feeling. It doesn’t go down easy.

“How’s living the dream?” Jared asks, and he’s pretty sure none of his resentment comes out in the question. He hopes so, at least.

“It’s pretty cool,” Chaz says, and Jared doesn’t know if he’s underplaying it to spare Jared’s feelings or if he doesn’t appreciate it as much as he should. He doesn’t like either of those options.

“Cool,” Jared repeats.

“You should come to our game on Friday,” Chaz says. “I can get you a ticket. You can come out with us after if we win, meet the guys.”

Jared almost immediately says yes, the fanboy part of him apparently refusing to die, but then, he’s an Oiler now, technically, even if he isn’t on the roster, and he doubts any of his prospective teammates would be impressed by that. Never mind Bryce, if he isn’t prepped on his boyfriend showing up out of the blue. Bryce isn’t a very good actor, judging from camp. It’d probably go pretty wrong.

“I dunno,” Jared says. “I mean, I’m the enemy.”

“Pft,” Chaz says, and Jared tries not to take that as a ‘pft, how can you be when you didn’t even make the Oilers’, because he knows Chaz would never say that, wouldn’t even think it. Chaz is a nice guy, like, legitimately nice. And here Jared is, a petty sulking fuck.

“I’ll have to see what my very busy and important self is doing that night,” Jared says. After all, he obviously has so many other things to do, like — watch the game at home. 

“Do that,” Chaz says. “And come. You’ll like them.”

Jared is way, way ahead of him in one particular case. Well, two, he guesses, but no offence to Chaz, Bryce is kind of the standout there.

He makes a noncommittal sound, checks his phone for the time and finds out he’s due at the Saddledome for pregame.

“Be nice to the newbies,” Chaz says, when Jared heads out.

“No promises,” Jared says. “One of them’s named Jerzy. I can’t be nice to someone named Jerzy. It was hard enough being nice to a Chaz.”

“Bite me,” Chaz says. 

“Maybe on Friday,” Jared says, then reminds himself that it would be a terrible idea to consider going even if his boyfriend wasn’t on the roster, tells himself to put it out of his head.

He has a feeling he isn’t going to succeed.


End file.
